Richmond Hill’s girls and boys cross country teams had an impressive start to their seasons, as both squads placed high in the Daffin Park Kickoff Classic Saturday in on Savannah.

The Lady Wildcats raced to a third-place finish out of 19 teams in the 5,000-meter course. Junior Amanda Elliott led the way, finishing second overall with a time of 21:11. Shanee McKee (23:01), Rachel Hammesfahr (23:04), Emily Hollowell (23:05), Natalie Davis (23:27) and Chloe Giorgianni (24:01) all placed in the top 50 for Richmond Hill.

On the boys side, the Wildcats placed seventh out of 26 teams. Freshman Dax Jacobsen had the highest finish for Richmond Hill in his first varsity race, earning 21st place with a time of 18:33. Sophomore Tanner Hicks (18:48) was 27th, and senior Clint Martin was 31st.

“It went pretty well. Both teams did a little bit better than I thought we would do,” Sybert said. “A lot of newcomers have made a difference for us. They’ve all got a really good attitude and are all striving to compete at a higher level.”

Martin and Hicks are the only two returners from last year’s top seven on the boys side, which is getting contributions from Jacobsen, sophomore Conner Shortridge, sophomore Zarrius Walker, senior Gareth Price and sophomore Austyn Harris, all of whom are new to the program.

“Clint and Tanner were the only two guys out of this group who were even on the team a year ago,” Sybert said. “The boys only placed one spot higher than they did last year (at Daffin Park), but the field was also bigger this year too by a lot of teams.

“We all ran pretty strong. We have to get better every time we race; that’s the goal. We’re racing against a lot of these same teams a good bit, so the bar has been set.”